


Undead, undead, undead

by DetroitBabe



Category: Re-Animator (Movies)
Genre: Domestic, M/M, Mild Gore, Reluctant Sidekick to Friends to Lovers, oh my god they were housemates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-28
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:40:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27669001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DetroitBabe/pseuds/DetroitBabe
Summary: “If you died,” Herbert began, and saw Dan open his mouth, and put up a hand to stop him. “If I found your dead body, I would have tried my hardest to reanimate you. As a friend, you understand. Wouldn’t you have done the same for me?”
Relationships: Daniel Cain/Herbert West
Kudos: 42





	Undead, undead, undead

**Author's Note:**

> The plot is this: six months after the Miskatonic massacre, Herbert shows up at Daniel's door. Friends who raise the dead together, stay together, and all that. But can a mad scientist have little a kiss, as a treat?  
> I still haven't seen Bride, so I'm not sure how much I'm contradicting, but it's also not like I care. Also my concept changed about 5 times while writing this and I can't be arsed to sleep on it for a final proofread tomorrow, so it's possibly kinda disjointed but whatever. Bon appetit.

Herbert West was dead.

Yes, there was the small matter of his body being officially unaccounted for, last time Dan checked, before he stopped checking, but maybe he was just torn into too small pieces. Dan had nightmares about it for a while, so he should know. Didn’t see a reason to torture himself with false hope. Herbert West showed up and turned Dan’s life upside down, almost got him killed, got Meg killed (that was West’s fault no matter how you slice it), and in the end got himself killed, and Dan left him behind to save Meg and he didn’t manage that either, so now they were both dead, and Dan lived alone, forcing himself to finish his degree so that he has a profession beyond being sad, and he still dreamed about someday saving somebody’s life, for a change. Meanwhile, Herbert West was most definitely gone, and it was most definitely for the better.

It wasn’t like he missed the man. No, that would be a bit like missing a hurricane after it blew through your house and left you standing in the ruins without as much as a goodbye. When Herbert West left a room, people usually experienced a sudden and overwhelming sense of relief, and Dan wasn’t really an exception. He just felt guilty for abandoning the man, however awful he was, to a particularly gruesome fate. A natural reaction. Guilt. Yes, that was a more reasonable name to give to what he was feeling.

***

There was nothing better on TV than reruns of old movies, which, all things considered, wasn’t the worst possible way to spend an evening. Dan settled on the sofa, a plate of reheated pizza on his lap, and watched Bela Lugosi rise stiffly out of his coffin. By all logic, he should’ve been sick to death of doom, gloom and corpses, but he didn’t really care. It was the same indifference that let him stay in Arkham, after all that’s happened, only moving into a more affordable and less haunted place: a force of momentum bordering on self-destructive. Outside, the rain was falling in sheets, and first echoes of thunder rumbled in the distance. Inside, Dan was sinking into meandering thoughts about creatures of the night, when the doorbell rang.

He would've said something inane, like “it’s you!”, or “you’re alive!”, if he wasn't too stunned to speak, so instead he just stood there with his mouth open. A flash of lightning illuminated the unexpected visitor’s face ominously, because the world was funny like that. He probably waited for the storm to make his entrance, the bastard. Sat in a motel room somewhere nearby for the past few days, checking the weather forecast for a promise of a suitably dramatic ambience, and when the moment came, walked here in the pouring rain, knowing well enough that Dan would be too nice to not let him inside.

“May I come in?”

Just that, without even a hello, how are you. Vampires were at least supposed to ask for an invitation. Herbert  _ did _ ask, sure, but he also already had one foot on the doorstep, and a small suitcase in his hand. Rain cascaded in waterfalls down his old-fashioned hat and coat.

“I thought you were dead,” Dan managed after an agonizingly long while.

“Well, I’m clearly not,” Herbert replied impatiently, leaning slightly forwards, right into Dan’s personal space, out of the shadows into the warm light of the hallway, blocked so annoyingly by the bigger man’s frame. “I’m positively soaked, though. It’s very cold outside,” he added in a pointed tone, an obvious statement for a pointless remark. Dan finally budged.

“Sure,” he said, stepping aside to let Herbert through. His guest looked around as he was led into the living room, critically appraising the space, as if he was about to comment on the colour of the wallpaper and how it clashed with the furniture, or raise a disapproving eyebrow at the half-eaten leftovers left on the couch.

“Um, do you want some food? A drink?”

“No, thank you,” Herbert replied distractedly, for a moment appearing entirely absorbed by the monochrome horrors on the TV screen. A part of Dan’s brain was still thinking gothic thoughts, and zeroed in on the refusal with an alarmed realisation.  _ I’ve never seen him eat, _ he thought, paranoically.  _ What does he eat? _ The only time he had seen the inside of Herbert’s fridge, during the short period when they lived together, there was nothing in it except a stockpile of chemicals and the corpse of Dan’s unfortunate cat. He went into the kitchen anyway, and came back with a plate of peanut butter sandwiches. There was a part of him that hoped Herbert would eat them, turn out allergic, and die. There was a part of him that felt like a leaden weight was lifted off of it, because Herbert was sitting in his living room, gloriously, infuriatingly alive.

“Your old place was bigger,” he said, taking one of the sandwiches and sniffing at it before taking a cautious bite.

“It’s been over six months,” Dan said coolly. Or not coolly, actually. One could even say hotly, considering the temperature of the emotions bubbling up underneath, so high that they began to rattle the lid he’s put on them. Herbert’s face would’ve been a picture of wide-eyed innocence, if a little of his sense of superiority and general disdain for social norms wasn’t showing through, ruining the effect.

“I had to lay low for a bit,” he explained lamely.

“You could have called!”

“And said what?” Herbert asked, raising his voice to match Dan’s frustration. “Hi, not dead, wanna to go grab a drink?” He mocked a casual tone, and then sighed. “I thought coming to see you in person would be a more… personable approach.”

“For God’s sake, stop acting like an alien.”  _ I thought we were friends, _ Dan almost said, when a flash of realization passed through his mind like a bolt of lightning.  _ He’s not here for me. _ Without a further word, he turned to the door and stomped off to his bedroom, noticing Herbert was following him. Alright, then. He unearthed the heavy bag filled with the bits and pieces of Herbert’s notes and equipment from the lower strata of his closet, and shoved it into Herbert’s hands with enough force to knock the smaller man off balance, making him half-fall, half-sit down awkwardly on the edge of Dan’s bed.

“All your friends are here,” Dan says, nodding at the bag. “You can get reacquainted. Should I leave you guys alone?”

“No, wait.” Herbert reached to grab Dan’s arm. “That’s not what I came here for. I mean, I’m glad you held onto this stuff for me, but as long as I’m alive, the notes, the ingredients, I can recreate all of it. Other things are harder to replace.”

Oh, that was rich.

“Such as?” Dan sneered, teasingly, because seeing Herbert get progressively wound up was just about the only joy he could get out of this situation.

“A loyal assistant. A place to conduct the work undisturbed. I learned the value of that, believe me. I’ve made more progress in Arkham than I have ever since I had a first successful trial --”

“This must be the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

“I don’t have anywhere else to go.” Last time Herbert made those eyes at him, it was over the body of poor twice dead Rufus; now, he had the disadvantage of Dan knowing him better already. And yet, once again, against all reason, it was working.

“You’ve managed so far,” Dan replied, the last biting remark as his resolve was crumbling.

“Alright, if you want me to say it, I will say it. I don’t want to go anywhere else.” Too much. Too much like a heartfelt sentiment that a human being might express. Almost too good to be true.

“You’re paying rent.”

“No problem.”

“No reanimating in the house.”

The face Herbert made was so comically shocked and offended that Dan almost burst out laughing, and in the process discovered, to his small discomfort and alarm, that he wasn’t quite so angry anymore. He was done for. He was going to compromise.

“Fine, no reanimating  _ people _ in the house. Can’t you stick to rats, or something? The basement has rats, occasionally. You’ll be better than poison.”

***

Things they shared:

Rent and utilities, split evenly in half between them, and Dan never asked where Herbert got his money from.

The basement space, with Herbert’s workbench crammed behind a folding screen in the far, unoccupied corner of the laundry room.

A meal, on the rare occasions Dan managed to persuade Herbert to join him.

A taste in music, as it turned out.

Things they did not share:

The chores. Herbert cleaned, since he made the worst of the messes. Dan did grocery shopping and cooking, since Herbert was useless on this front. Dan did the laundry. Herbert took out the garbage.

A room. Herbert took the spare bedroom. It was only gathering dust up to now.

Their thoughts, kept private.

Secrets.

Feelings.

***

“ _ There was a liiiiiiine, there was a formula… _ ”

Dan sang along to the radio, busying himself in the kitchen. He was in a good mood. Passed one of the important exams, which gave him some hope for the future. Herbert has officially abandoned the pursuit of formal education, feeling that there wasn’t anything useful they could teach him anymore, but Dan didn’t want to make his living off graverobbing. His colleagues invited him to have a few drinks later that night to celebrate, and maybe he’d go. But something made him want to share his success with the mad scientist in his basement as well, even though that meant going through a round of complaints about Dan having his priorities wrong, being so concerned with his degree and the general outside world when the  _ real _ important stuff was happening right under his nose.

“ _ Sharp as a kniiiiife _ \-- ouch! Shit.”

The radio, battery-powered, went on, but the lights went out, and in the first moment of surprise the knife slipped in Dan’s hand, cutting deep into his finger. He put it in his mouth as it began to bleed, mumbling curses and groping blindly for the wall with his other hand. He remembered there was a flashlight on the coat hanger in the hallway, which Herbert used for his nightly escapades. Dan moved carefully along the wall, waiting for his eyes to get accustomed to the dark. Hallway, flashlight, basement, fuse box, bathroom, bandages. That was the plan.

Hallway --

He heard a crash coming from downstairs.

Flashlight --

A piercing scream. Dan couldn’t tell whose throat it might’ve come out of. He found the torch and switched it on, sweeping the beam of light around him.

Basement door --

A loud clatter. A hollow thud. Mad wailing. A horrible, gurgling noise, squelching, tearing, breaking. A moment of hesitation. If he locked the door, pushed something heavy against it for good measure, eventually anybody or anything that was down there would die, right? Problem solved. All his worst problems solved.

Not so easy, probably. Whatever survived down there could likely be somewhat alive for a very long time. If it was Herbert who came out on top, that wouldn’t be so bad, but if it was one of his creations… Dan looked around for a weapon. The door swung open.

The lesser of two evils stood there, panting heavily. His shirt, drenched in blood and sweat, clung to his skin, but he appeared unharmed save for a few bumps and scratches. A piece of fleshy matter detached from the shovel still clutched in his hand, and landed on the floor with a wet plop. West adjusted his glasses.

“All dealt with,” he said, a little out of breath. “Don’t worry. Would you mind passing me that torch? I think I had a short circuit.”

Dan was already pushing past him and bounding down the stairs. Herbert caught up with him as the lights, restored, flooded the makeshift laboratory, mercilessly exposing the mess. He circled Dan awkwardly, moving into his line of sight, which currently fell onto the torso still twitching on the floor by the overturned table. Too late.

“One hell of a rat, that one.”

Herbert sighed, squaring up for the inevitable dressing-down. 

“I know, I know.”

Dan looked around. There were cables trailing behind the dismembered bits strewn across the floor, which included a cut-off head, its eyes blinking madly like stroboscope disco lights. On the shelf above, there was an honest to God brain in a jar, also all wired up.

“Experimenting with electricity now, doctor Frankenstein?”

“Frankenstein was a hack,” Herbert replied, offended. “I was trying to use electricity to simulate and modulate the action potential in the neurons. I was hoping to help the subjects in maintaining their faculties, and a better control of their bodies --” he stopped as he saw Dan put a hand to his forehead, leaving a bloody smear across his face. “Daniel, your hand!”

“It’s nothing. I cut myself in the kitchen.”

“Let me see.” Against Dan’s feeble protestations, Herbert grabbed his hand, and examined the wound. “I could stitch it up for you,” he offered. “It would help.”

Dan didn’t seem enthusiastic about the prospect.

“I’ve had proper medical training, remember?” Herbert reminded him.

“Alright, alright. Just don’t put any of your… green stuff on it, okay?”

He watched Herbert put his workbench back up, and clear it hastily. He really was stronger than he looked, Dan thought. Carrying the bodies as well, the dead weight of an entire adult human. You’d never think it possible, looking at him. Was it a side effect of taking the reagent? In the movies, the undead were always stronger than normal, living humans. He reeled, and dropped down heavily by the table.

“Are you okay?”

“Just a bit light-headed, that’s all.”

“You’ve had a fright, and some minor blood loss,” Herbert replied, sympathetically. It was strange to see him so… caring, and right after committing bloody murder.

“No, it’s not that. You’re… you’ll be operating on me. Oh, god.” Dan let out a short, hysteric giggle. He felt Herbert hold his hand down, the pulsating pain, felt the stinging cold of the disinfecting alcohol, the prick of the needle, the strange, nauseating sensation of it pushing through his skin --

“Eugh.”

“Easy, now.”

“Herbert?”

“You can talk if it helps you,” Herbert said without looking up, entirely focused on the job at hand.

“Herbert, if I died… would you… are you gonna use my body? For your experiments, I mean.”

Herbert shot him a quick glance before returning his attention to the stitching; they had locked eyes just for a second.

“I tried to reanimate Meg, you know. After we got out of the morgue, one of the zombies that went after us attacked her. I tried to save her, but I was too slow. So I tried to bring her back. Gave her a full dose. She did wake up, screaming and throwing up blood, but didn’t last long. Maybe that’s for the better, you know? I wasn’t thinking, I just wanted to save her, but if she went all berserk like the others, and I had to -- to kill her, I --”

Herbert tensed, looking visibly uncomfortable.

“I’m sorry,” Dan said, suddenly embarrassed by this outpour of emotion. Herbert finished his work.

“Done,” he said quietly. “You can go back upstairs. I’ll clean up here.”

The adrenaline rush leaving him, Dan felt suddenly exhausted. And he wanted out of this room, cramped and stinking of death.

“Leave it. I was making us dinner. It’s probably burned to a crisp by now, but we can order pizza, or something. Just clean  _ yourself _ up first, ‘cause you look awful. You’re gonna scare the delivery man.”

They sat on the opposite ends of the couch. Herbert cross-legged, hunched slightly forwards, nursing a bottle of beer that he sipped from slowly, cautiously, as if he was more afraid of it than of whatever he cooked up in his lab; Dan sprawled in his corner, still feeling a bit woozy, observing the other man with a kind of groggy fondness. In this light, wearing clean, non-bloodied clothes, with his hair combed neatly over his forehead to conceal the scar left by Dr. Hill’s brain surgery attempt, West looked comfortingly unassuming. It seemed that at least some of the earlier tension was gone, left behind the basement door, among the dead and almost-dead and not-dead-anymore and dead-again.

“What are you staring at?”

“It’s always so reassuring to see you eat human food,” Dan replied.

“What else would I eat?”

“Dunno. Wouldn’t be surprised to see you drink blood.”

Herbert raised an eyebrow.

“So, am I Frankenstein or Dracula? I’m no expert, but even I know you’re mangling your references.”

“You’re…” Dan thought about it for a moment, and scenes from earlier this evening replayed in his mind. He shook his head. “You’re insane. Honestly, I don’t know why I let you do your stuff in my house.”

“And  _ I _ don’t understand why you still feel the need to pretend that you resent me,” Herbert countered with a small shrug. Dan’s mouth popped open.

“You -- you’re  _ unbelievable _ . Not only mad, but the most arrogant, self-important --”

“Astonishing? Brilliant?”

“--  _ obnoxious _ person I know.”

***

“I don’t think that one’s salvageable,” Dan said, bringing one of Herbert’s shirts up to the light and examining it critically. Underneath the fresh stains there were older ones, washed-off pinks and greens and yellows, and the fabric was practically eaten through by bleach in some places. A frayed gash across the shoulder was the final nail to the abused garment’s coffin, and it landed in the second basket currently occupied by a stack of old newspapers, some bits of wood, and a human leg.

“I’m putting it on the bonfire pile.”

“Mhm,” Herbert muttered without looking up from his notebook.

“You know, I’m dreading the day one of the neighbours tries to get themselves invited to one of our barbecue parties.”

“Mmm.”

Dan finished loading up the laundry, and leaned on the washing machine, watching Herbert puzzle over something in his notes, tapping a pencil on his bottom lip.

“You know, you go through them so fast… Have you ever considered working without a shirt on?”

“Very funny,” Herbert muttered dryly.

“I’m serious. It would be easier to just take a shower afterwards.”

“How very logical of you.”

For a baffling second, Dan thought he heard something new in Herbert’s voice there, a note of droll amusement that could’ve bordered on flirtatious, if it weren’t Herbert West we were talking about, who had about as much capacity for romance as a dead rat. No, he was probably imagining things. Why would he imagine something like that?

Most of the time, Herbert worked alone, unless he specifically asked for Daniel’s assistance; and Dan was generally content to leave him to it. He did usually wait for Herbert to emerge from the basement, though, sometimes with dinner or a rented movie, sometimes just to make sure he was still alive, and say goodnight. But Herbert was taking his time tonight, so Dan eventually went to his room, only to discover he couldn’t sleep, listening for the sound of familiar footsteps in the corridor. Part force of habit, part budding worry, he knew it was going to keep him up either way. Grumbling quietly to himself, he got out of bed, and padded to the staircase door.

“You alright down there?” he shouted, sticking his head through. He could see the lights were on, and could hear some movement.

“Yes,” came a laconic reply. Dan shook his head and went inside.

“Are you going to stay up all night? I’m working the morning shift tomorrow, I can check on you on my way out, wake you up if you fall asleep at your desk again --” He stopped abruptly as he reached the bottom of the stairs, greeted by an unexpected sight.

Instead of his customary shirt and tie, Herbert was wearing nothing but an apron, an ordinary kitchen apron, and he was just in the process of taking it off. It had a polka dot print, red on white. There were considerably more dots on it now, although they formed a less regular pattern. That wasn’t really what bothered Dan; seeing Herbert half-undressed, for the first time ever, was much more disturbing. And what he noticed, as he came closer, was the thick, raw pink scar that began just under Herbert’s right clavicle, and ran down to the sternum. That was all of it, but Dan was a med student, and his mind immediately filled in the blanks. Herbert stood frozen in place when Dan’s fingers traced the interrupted line from its beginning to end, bones hard underneath the pale skin. They looked at each other. Herbert’s jaw was clenched so tight that his chin was trembling slightly.

“I woke up on the autopsy table,” he said, answering the unspoken question. “Gave the poor doctor quite a start. I was the first of the recovered bodies that he got to. He had imagined he was leaving the worst for last. He almost had a heart attack. They were all very apologetic afterwards.”

“But how --”

“Must have been the serum in my system. For the first time in a while, I was grateful for my little habit.”

“You’re dead,” Dan said, shocked.

“Am I?” Herbert grabbed Dan’s wrist and brought his hand up to his face, so close Dan could feel his breath on his skin when he spoke.

“Do I seem dead to you?”

Another tug and Dan’s fingers were pressed against Herbert’s neck, and the pulsating artery.

“Your final diagnosis, doctor Cain?”

The gestures suddenly felt uncomfortably intimate. Dan snatched his hand away.

“You know what I mean,” he said, exasperatedly. “You’re obviously alive right now, but you’re… reanimated.”

“I’m not so sure, actually. A near death experience of some sort, perhaps. I don’t think the concentration of the reagent that I had in my bloodstream would have been enough to bring me back if I was truly dead.”

“You don’t know that, do you? Or is this why you started injecting yourself with it? As a… precaution?”

“You told me you tried to bring Megan back. Would you have treated her like this, too? Assaulted her with questions? Looked at her this way? Horrified? Disgusted?” Herbert was hitting that agitated, dramatic tone he usually reserved for talking about the latest breakthrough in his research, or another brilliant idea he had.

“That’s different. I was in love with her!”

Dan didn’t like the way Herbert tilted his head, the way he frowned, but the corner of his mouth twitched in a brief sneer.

“So you would only make exceptions? The gift of life is for your girlfriend, and nobody else? Because I’m working to bring it to all of humanity. And I recall you were quite ready to join me, once.”

“Yeah, well, that was before your little zombie apocalypse,” Dan growled back.

“If  _ you _ died,” Herbert began, and saw Dan open his mouth, and put up a hand to stop him. “If I found your dead body, I would have tried my hardest to reanimate you. As a friend, you understand. Wouldn’t you have done the same for me?”

The earnestness in Herbert’s voice contrasted sharply with the morbid nature of the statement, but it was moving, in its own bizarre way. It was certainly heartfelt enough to make Dan consider his answer. West was definitely growing on him. Like mold on stale bread.

“As a friend,” he echoed. Herbert shrugged.

“Well, if that’s what you want to call it.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“I’m not blind, Daniel. I see the looks.”

“You -- I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Dan stammered, defensively, and despite all the distractions on display, he was looking at nothing else except straight into Herbert’s eyes. And at his lips. But that was purely to focus on what he was saying.

Madness, pure madness. That little smartass was seeing right through him, and having the time of his life. And Dan wanted to kiss him. And he couldn’t.

“I’m… I don’t think I’m into it.”

“Men?” Herbert seemed surprised.

“Dead people.”

“I told you, I am not dead. And that’s an expert opinion, mind you.”

Dan felt a sense of wounded pride, letting himself be pressed like this.

“I’ll be the judge of that,” he replied, haughtily, nonsensically, trying to build up his confidence and sound sexy, with his head empty and ears red.

***

Herbert West was alive.


End file.
